.... series on D-Addicts.

Anyone know?

Is it based on country? That seems like the simplest way, but I also see programs that are joint productions. Also, not all mention the language on their forum pages.

Good question. I've noticed that they have cdrama and hkdrama categories. Presumably the later is all Cantonese but I'm not sure if just because a show is a cdrama, it's necessarily in Mandarin.

They ***** everything up. I've seen many dramas that were originally in cantonese but dubbed in mandarin, and vise versa.

But it has been a long time since I've used D-Addicts, their torrents rae all too high quality for my shit house Australian internet connection.

So anyone know any easily identifiable auditory difference between the two? I saw that Russel Peters comedy special, I wonder how accurate it though.

I plan on doing a lot of listening to the language before I start it next year.

Well I don't know D-addicts, I assume it's an online drama streaming site, won't it just be obvious if you click it and listen the first minutes...?

Musashi Wrote:Well I don't know D-addicts, I assume it's an online drama streaming site, won't it just be obvious if you click it and listen the first minutes...?

If only life were so simple.... sigh...

kazelee Wrote:

Musashi Wrote:Well I don't know D-addicts, I assume it's an online drama streaming site, won't it just be obvious if you click it and listen the first minutes...?

If only life were so simple.... sigh...

Aww...
But thats no easy feat. tackling cantonese for obviously more tones but also since study material is not as abundant as mandarin. And spoken is quite different from written language. Good luck though.

Shoot! Lost another one to lack of study material.

Screw this, I'm learning Spanish.

You can tell by the tones. The sound and the flow of the two languages are quite different, thanks to the tones. Another easy way is by learning the numbers 1-10 in both Cantonese and Mandarin, then try and identify when they're spoken. But if you can't tell the difference by now, then you're gonna need a lot of listening practice.

stehr Wrote:But if you can't tell the difference by now, then you're gonna need a lot of listening practice.

By now? I haven't even started. LOL. I was just watching a Jackie Chan flick and wondering which language he was speaking.

Just got the idea to hit up the first few iKnow chinese lessons. That'll help for sure.... I think.

The easiest way IMO, is... to look at the Hanzi subtitles if available. Mandarin is in simplified Hanzi, and if you're studying them (traditional or not) then you should be able to tell which is which.(of course unless the Audio is Cantonese or Mandaring and the subs are in the other, then haha, I have no easy way to tell you, but just go to youtube and listen to each language eventually you can pick them out rather easily, I promise, haha)

Cantonese sounds like a record played backwards.

Yonosa Wrote:The easiest way IMO, is... to look at the Hanzi subtitles if available. Mandarin is in simplified Hanzi, and if you're studying them (traditional or not) then you should be able to tell which is which.(of course unless the Audio is Cantonese or Mandaring and the subs are in the other, then haha, I have no easy way to tell you, but just go to youtube and listen to each language eventually you can pick them out rather easily, I promise, haha)

This is not accurate. Mandarin is written using Simplified Chinese if it's from the Mainland or Singapore. It's written in Traditional in Taiwan. And yes, sometimes you will have something that gives you the choice of Simplified or Traditional.

The real way to tell is this: Cantonese sounds like fighting cats, and Mandarin sounds pleasant.

Really, if you can't tell by the difference in intonation, listen to the syllables. Mandarin syllables will only end with a vowel, -n, or -ng. Cantonese has these plus -p, -t, -k, and -m. And they say aaaaaah a lot at the end of sentencesaaaaaah.

bflatnine Wrote:

Yonosa Wrote:The easiest way IMO, is... to look at the Hanzi subtitles if available. Mandarin is in simplified Hanzi, and if you're studying them (traditional or not) then you should be able to tell which is which.(of course unless the Audio is Cantonese or Mandaring and the subs are in the other, then haha, I have no easy way to tell you, but just go to youtube and listen to each language eventually you can pick them out rather easily, I promise, haha)

This is not accurate. Mandarin is written using Simplified Chinese if it's from the Mainland or Singapore. It's written in Traditional in Taiwan. And yes, sometimes you will have something that gives you the choice of Simplified or Traditional.

The real way to tell is this: Cantonese sounds like fighting cats, and Mandarin sounds pleasant.

Really, if you can't tell by the difference in intonation, listen to the syllables. Mandarin syllables will only end with a vowel, -n, or -ng. Cantonese has these plus -p, -t, -k, and -m. And they say aaaaaah a lot at the end of sentencesaaaaaah.

I was generally speaking of only Mainland China, but that is true because an awful lot more taiwanese media seems to be available easily over their Mainland counterparts. So in fact it really might be more common to see Taiwanese Mandarin unless one specifically goes looking for the simplified stuff, as far as media goes anyways, then again I'm probably just completely incorrect.

bflatnine Wrote:The real way to tell is this: Cantonese sounds like fighting cats, and Mandarin sounds pleasant.

Really, if you can't tell by the difference in intonation, listen to the syllables. Mandarin syllables will only end with a vowel, -n, or -ng. Cantonese has these plus -p, -t, -k, and -m. And they say aaaaaah a lot at the end of sentencesaaaaaah.

You've got it backwards ! Heh, imo Cantonese sounds better than Mandarin. There's so much more character to the language. I love that aaaaahh sound !

I like the sound of Mandarin better. It's a lot more elegant to my ears and seems to roll off the tongue easily. But maybe the harshness of Cantonese reminds me too much of Vietnamese which I speak at home -_-.

stehr Wrote:

bflatnine Wrote:The real way to tell is this: Cantonese sounds like fighting cats, and Mandarin sounds pleasant.

Really, if you can't tell by the difference in intonation, listen to the syllables. Mandarin syllables will only end with a vowel, -n, or -ng. Cantonese has these plus -p, -t, -k, and -m. And they say aaaaaah a lot at the end of sentencesaaaaaah.

You've got it backwards ! Heh, imo Cantonese sounds better than Mandarin. There's so much more character to the language. I love that aaaaahh sound !

I actually really like Cantonese too, I was just having some fun.

Nii87 Wrote:I like the sound of Mandarin better. It's a lot more elegant to my ears and seems to roll off the tongue easily. But maybe the harshness of Cantonese reminds me too much of Vietnamese which I speak at home -_-.

Strange, I speak Vietnamese at home too (giong xi gon), but I find Cantonese sounds much more pleasing than Mandarin. For me, it's more entertaining to listen to. I also like that the numbers are nearly identical in Cantonese and Vietnamese; nhat, nhi, tam, tu.. Although, I also agree with you that Mandarin sounds more elegant.